Skip to main content

How can a carol service be missional?


I'm putting together a carol service for my church. I'd love this to be an outreach to the local community. That's what the congregation wants. But I'm mulling over how to make this a missional event.

When we expect people to come to a carol service are we working from Christendom assumptions - assuming everyone is basically Christian and so will want (and be able) to sing carols? Are we relying on the Christian cultural remnants hanging around society? Is it a bad thing if we are? How much longer are those remnants going to hang around? Or are we moving into a society where people are as likely to go to church at Christmas as go to a Mosque at Eid?

Is this a time for Unitarians to paint themselves as Christians to draw upon the Christian themes in culture? Or should a Unitarian carol service look distinctively different from the carol service that you would get in the Anglican service down the road?

How can a carol service be missional?

Comments

Anonymous said…
I think you assume people have, at best, knowledge of Christmas carols through school. I'd take advantage of this by including mostly well known carols, but bring in the Unitarian aspect by picking less common readings (if you're having readings).

All this assumes that you can actually get people through the door. You might consider advertising it as an alternative Xmas carol service, but I don't know whether that will encourage people or not.
12:01 pm
Andrew Bethune said…
What time of day or night is your planned service? In my possibly limited experience of a small Scottish town, a big city and an English rural market town the midnight service, whether mass or carols, is what attracts many who rarely go to church.

Maybe you could draw on the viewpoints and belief of your congregation. Get some of them to give their reflections on what Chrsitmas and Jesus mean to them, or what their questionings about Christmas might be.
12:17 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What does it mean to be non-creedal?

Steve Caldwell says "The problem here isn't humanism vs. theism for theist Unitarian Universalists -- it's the non-creedal nature of Unitarian Universalism" This is a good point. We need to think much more deeply about what it means to be a non-creedal religion. The first thing I want to say is that there is more than one possible understanding of non-creedalism. The Disciples of Christ are a non-creedal church, they say here : " Freedom of belief. Disciples are called together around one essential of faith: belief in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Persons are free to follow their consciences guided by the Bible, the Holy Spirit study and prayer, and are expected to extend that freedom to others." Quakers are also non-creedal and say here : Quakers have no set creed or dogma - that means we do not have any declared statements which you have to believe to be a Quaker. There are, however, some commonly held views which unite us. One accepted view is that th...
3 comments
Read more

LOST and theology: who are the good guys?

***Spoiler alert*** I'm continuing some theological/philosophical reflections while re-watching the series LOST. One of the recurring themes in LOST is the idea of the "good guys" and the "bad guys." We start the series assuming the survivors (who are the main characters) are the "good guys" and the mysterious "Others" are definitely bad guys. But at the end of series 2 one of the main characters asks the Others, "Who are  you people?" and they answer, in an extremely disturbing way, "We're the good guys." The series develops with a number of different factions appearing, "the people from the freighter" "the DHARMA initiative" as well as divisions among the original survivors. The question remains among all these complicated happenings "who really are the good guys?" I think one of the most significant lines in the series is an episode when Hurley is having a conversation with ...
3 comments
Read more

Is humanism theologically tolerant?

OK, well this might be controversial, but I feel the need to say it. Is humanist tolerant? Please note I'm not asking about humanism within society. Clearly humanism certainly believes in tolerance within society and I'm forever glad they are often the only people in the media calling for a separation of church and state. No, what I'm talking about is descriptions of Unitarianism like this and adverts like this , discussed at Peacebang here , which say that humanism is one option, Christianity is another, God is one option among many. The trouble is, humanism, by definition is theologically opposed to theism. This is very different from the relationship between Christianity and Buddhism. These two traditions may be vastly different, but Buddhism, by definition , is not opposed to Christianity, and Christianity, by definition , is not opposed to Buddhism. But humanism is consciously defined in opposition to Christianity and theism. So to say that humanism and theism can bot...
14 comments
Read more